Post by Cannonball on Dec 28, 2006 15:44:48 GMT -5
With the glorious assistance of Reineke NPC'ing Brenda for me. SMEWCH!
He was fidgeting. Sam always fidgeted when he was anxious or excited. And right now he was both anxious AND excited. He'd not seen Brenda at all in over two months, not since she had been back to collect some of her stuff - and then they had ended up shouting at each other. This time, however, was different. This was neutral territory.
An as-yet untouched cafe latte sat on the table in front of him and his eyes were fixed on the door. Every time it opened, his heart leapt into his mouth. He actually felt surprisingly sick about the situation, almost to the point that he was considering fleeing. But that would just be childish and stupid and...
Well, unreasonable, quite frankly.
So he sat his ground. He'd carefully dressed in his smartest clothes, a pair of light-coloured slacks and an open-necked shirt in navy blue. He had even brushed down his hair, which was already on the verge of reaching critical mass and exploding out again.
Brenda was late. She stepped through the door in a somber grey business suit, skirt cut to her knee, smart jacket trimmed in a nearly black burgundy. A simple silver cross hung around her neck, and her fingers worked it- the only sign the woman felt anything other than annoyance as she looked around, saw her soon to be ex-husband, and walked over, sitting quickly before he could offer her a chair or stare at her with adoration.
Setting her purse on the floor beside her high heels, Brenda's eyes flickered to his face for a moment. "Hi."
He recognised the cross. He'd bought it for her not long after they'd first met. He noticed as she fiddled with it that she was no longer wearing her wedding or engagement rings and that brought sadness to him.
"Can I get ya somethin' to drink, hon...Brenda? They do a wicked good mint mocha in here."
He gave her a nervous smile. She looked as beautiful as she always had and yet again he was slapped around the face by the reality of their marital status.
Brenda waved the idea of the mocha away. She seemed nervous, or was that just anger carefully shut behind a wall of civility. "A water will be fine, Sam." She added curtly a moment later, "Thanks."
When he'd come back, she took a drink, and tapped her fingers against the side of the glass as they sat there in silence. Then she looked more directly at him. "Well, I have a lot of things to do today. What was it you wanted to talk about?" She made it sound as if his questions on the phone were so insignificant, she'd forgotten entirely what they'd discussed.
He carefully put aside the hurt that her brusque manner was causing him and fetched back her water. "I wanted to talk about ... about...y'know. This."
Sam pulled the thick envelope from his pocket and tried to uncrease the worst of it as he lay it down on the table. "I don't understand what ya mean by 'unreasonable' behaviour, Bren, and to tell ya the truth, I ain't gonna sign nothin' I don't understand."
His blue eyes met hers and she saw the agony in their depths. He'd always left legal matters up to her - he was a civil engineer with expertise in explosives. Utility bills, that sort of thing, that had always been Brenda's side of the marriage. Fixing leaks, disposing of spiders, that had been his side. It had worked.
At least he'd figured it had.
Brenda frowned. She leaned in towards him, speaking in a hush. "Sam it's just legal verbage. I'm not going to hash out every failing in our marriage for you if you don't already know." Then the rest seemed to burst from her before she could stop it. "You know if you'd been around a little more often maybe you'd have seen 'us' falling apart before it happened. If you're confused now," her last words were a biting whisper. "-it's not-my-fault."
He stared at her incredulously.
"If I'd been around more? Bren, I HAD to be away! Ya practically ENCOURAGED me to take every job that came up, said it'd be good, that I'd get promotion, more money an' all that.."
He fingered the edge of the paper anxiously.
"Was I really that bad that it came to this? Why couldn't ya have told me 'bout the fact ya didn't want me to be away? Don't y'all see why I'm so confused, Brenda?"
His latte sat and got colder as he stared imploringly at her, willing her to say words he understood. "Was I mean to ya? Cruel? Did I do somethin' that made ya think I was a bad man? I never had eyes for noone else, still don't."
Brenda closed her eyes, and lifted her hands as if to push him away, but it was just a gesture. "You did enough. Okay?" Her eyes were blazing as she opened them again. "You did enough."
"You can't play ignoramus to your half of this Sam." Her words became more bitter, more hurt filled as she spoke. "I refuse to believe this is all in my head. You hurt me, Sam, you hurt me too dammit." She pointed at her heart, the anger that had replaced hurt burning on her eyes. "It's too late now. You weren't willing to make our dreams come true then, it's too late to do it now."
She looked out the window, her jaw tensing. He knew if they weren't in public a lot more would come, sharper things, things that made less sense but cut a lot deeper.
"I..." He couldn't look at her, didn't want her to see the tears in his eyes. "I always wanted to make all ya dreams come true, Brenda, really I did. That's why I worked so hard. To get the money we needed to have that nice apartment, the car ya wanted..."
He stared down at the table.
"It's 'cos of what I am, right?" He'd been honest with Brenda right from the start about his mutantcy, but it had never been a problem, or so he had figured. "Ya hate me for what I am. It's fine, I understand that. Back home in Kentucky, the whole damn town hated me." He sighed.
Sam traced a pattern on the table with one finger. "I woulda done anythin' ya asked," he said, quietly. "Ya had only to ask. I'm real sorry, Brenda. I'd do anythin' to make it right, honest I would."
"Oh for Christ's sake Sam it has nothing to do with you being-" she paused, her eyes darting to the rest of the cafe around them. "-you being a mutant." Though she said that, it was true her parents, her family, and the society club in Atlanta weren't really that keen on having a mutant in their midst. Brenda had loved him anyway. Had being the important part.
"I did ask, Sam." She spat at him. "I -did-. You act like I asked you to build me a castle in the sky with a pile of feathers and your bare hands. You know, a lot of guys would have married me back home, but I chose you." Without a doubt, there was regret in her voice. "I wasted my time with you, you stole years from my life. You're a miner, Sam. I'm Jack Shepard's granddaughter, Sam, do you think I belong married to a coal miner?? You never wanted to be anything better than that. And to top it off, what little you did bring home was split between us and your mother! As if it's my fault she couldn't close her legs long enough to get her own job. As if she doesn't have your stepdaddy to take care of all of you!" Brenda huffed.
"That's why I'm taking it all back Sammy," She said his name derisively. "The house, the car, the investment accounts, all of it." Her tone was final, and she took a drink of water as if to do so was somehow shoving something else in his face.
"My Momma," he said, his voice low and shaking, "is a fine woman - an' I'll thank ya to watch ya mouth when ya talk about her. An' I ain't disputin' that ya may as well take back the apartment an' the money, I don't give a damn 'bout any of that. I love ya, Brenda! Don't that count for nothin'? An' if ya knew that I weren't ever gonna amount to nothin' more than a coal miner..." He put the same venomous emphasis on the words that she had done, "then why d'y'all marry me at all?"
He was barely keeping it together now, seeing himself as she was painting him: a thoughtless prick of a man who didn't devote enough time and effort to a marriage he had sincerely believed was made in heaven.
"Don't ya care none for me any more?" he said, quietly. "Is it all since we had that talk 'bout me wantin' us to start a family an' y'all not wantin' to? 'Cos if that's what was the final push, Bren, I take it back. Honest I do. I love ya!"
He looked up at her and his eyes were bright with tears. "But ya ain't gonna come back to me, I see that. Are ya gonna leave me anythin'? Any money to start afresh?" He didn't tell her that he'd been signed off work with stress and depression. She'd already have known due to the decrease in the income to the bank account.
It wasn't like Brenda to crack- she could play fire and venom with anyone for days on end, and tended to go chilly and distant rather than break down. So when tears filled her eyes, Sam should have known something was wrong.
"Starting a family?" her voice shivered, choked with tears. "Well it's a little late for that now, ain't it Sam?" She stood up, grabbing her purse.
"So much for this. Next time you want to talk, you call my lawyer." She turned stiffly around and rushed out the door, tears spilling down her face.
It didn't take Sam long to pay and hurry out after her. He wasn't going to let it end like this, it wasn't in his nature to let a woman he had caused to cry rush away from him like that. He caught her trying to hail a cab and caught her arm.
"Brenda," he said, his voice gentle and soft. "I'm so sorry, honey. I didn't mean for us to part like this. Please, let's at least try to be civil with one another. Please. After this, I swear to God I ain't ever gonna trouble ya again."
"Sam it's just not going to work out," she said tearfully, pulling her arm away from his grip and wiping her eyes. "I'm not coming back. I don't want to hate each other. Alright? I don't."
She looked up and down the street, trying to stop tears, but not able to. "If you can't deal with the future, Sam... then we can't talk. We both have to think about what we're doing from here out. Not dwell on what happened. Okay? I can't do it. I just can't."
"Don't cry, honey," he said, and he sounded anguished. "Ah, please don't cry. Here." He fumbled in the pockets of his trousers and found a clean handkerchief which he gave her. "I figured it ain't gonna work out. Ya made that abundantly clear. All I'm askin' is for a chance for us to at least separate like decent people."
He sighed.
"An' if ya walk away from me now, with tears all over the place - an' ya mascara runnin' everywhere, I ain't exactly gonna have given that impression, am I?"
He tried a tentative smile.
"That's all I want, Bren. I ain't expectin' no more.
"That's not the way you make it sound," she said, wiping carefully under her eyes. The cab drove away. "Like you want to convince me back."
After a moment to gather herself, she spoke more softly. "Sam we never worked out as it was. I think if you think about it, you'll see that's the truth. We're not a good match. Never were."
Hiccuping a little, she swallowed hard, and calmed herself. "I'm sorry, Sam." It sounded a little defensive, as if Brenda was getting back to her old self as quickly as she could. "I am."
"Y'all are right," he said, a little sadly. "I'm a big hulkin' idiot an' ya always have an answer for everythin'. I got all the brawn whilst ya got all the brains. An' the beauty." He smiled at her again. "Guess I always DID wonder what ya stayed with me for anyway. But I need to hear from ya, Brenda, just for my OWN peace of mind."
He led her away slightly from the road edge so that they were more or less lost in the crowd.
"I ain't a bad man, am I? Ya know that if I did hurt ya, I never did it 'cos I was tryin' to cause ya pain?"
Brenda crossed her arms over herself. She shooked her head a little tightly. "I don't know Sam. I know you didn't want to hurt me. Didn't make it better when you did."
"Sam, I..." she sighed and looked around them again. "There's things we have to talk about. But you can't do this." Brenda shook her head. "I don't want to do this."
He studied her face carefully, then nodded. "OK," he said, simply. "I ain't gonna push. Y'all call me when ya ready to talk."
Smiling carefully at her, he took a step back. "I ain't goin' nowhere. I'm up in Westchester for now. Ya got my number."
Brenda nodded, meeting his eyes only briefly.
"Take care of yourself, Sam." There was a tone of bitterness in her voice, but it was obvious she was doing her best to be sincere.
Moments later, another cab had shown up. She looked at him again for only a moment, then opened the door, and got in. The cab drove away, disappearing behind a dozen other cars.
He was fidgeting. Sam always fidgeted when he was anxious or excited. And right now he was both anxious AND excited. He'd not seen Brenda at all in over two months, not since she had been back to collect some of her stuff - and then they had ended up shouting at each other. This time, however, was different. This was neutral territory.
An as-yet untouched cafe latte sat on the table in front of him and his eyes were fixed on the door. Every time it opened, his heart leapt into his mouth. He actually felt surprisingly sick about the situation, almost to the point that he was considering fleeing. But that would just be childish and stupid and...
Well, unreasonable, quite frankly.
So he sat his ground. He'd carefully dressed in his smartest clothes, a pair of light-coloured slacks and an open-necked shirt in navy blue. He had even brushed down his hair, which was already on the verge of reaching critical mass and exploding out again.
Brenda was late. She stepped through the door in a somber grey business suit, skirt cut to her knee, smart jacket trimmed in a nearly black burgundy. A simple silver cross hung around her neck, and her fingers worked it- the only sign the woman felt anything other than annoyance as she looked around, saw her soon to be ex-husband, and walked over, sitting quickly before he could offer her a chair or stare at her with adoration.
Setting her purse on the floor beside her high heels, Brenda's eyes flickered to his face for a moment. "Hi."
He recognised the cross. He'd bought it for her not long after they'd first met. He noticed as she fiddled with it that she was no longer wearing her wedding or engagement rings and that brought sadness to him.
"Can I get ya somethin' to drink, hon...Brenda? They do a wicked good mint mocha in here."
He gave her a nervous smile. She looked as beautiful as she always had and yet again he was slapped around the face by the reality of their marital status.
Brenda waved the idea of the mocha away. She seemed nervous, or was that just anger carefully shut behind a wall of civility. "A water will be fine, Sam." She added curtly a moment later, "Thanks."
When he'd come back, she took a drink, and tapped her fingers against the side of the glass as they sat there in silence. Then she looked more directly at him. "Well, I have a lot of things to do today. What was it you wanted to talk about?" She made it sound as if his questions on the phone were so insignificant, she'd forgotten entirely what they'd discussed.
He carefully put aside the hurt that her brusque manner was causing him and fetched back her water. "I wanted to talk about ... about...y'know. This."
Sam pulled the thick envelope from his pocket and tried to uncrease the worst of it as he lay it down on the table. "I don't understand what ya mean by 'unreasonable' behaviour, Bren, and to tell ya the truth, I ain't gonna sign nothin' I don't understand."
His blue eyes met hers and she saw the agony in their depths. He'd always left legal matters up to her - he was a civil engineer with expertise in explosives. Utility bills, that sort of thing, that had always been Brenda's side of the marriage. Fixing leaks, disposing of spiders, that had been his side. It had worked.
At least he'd figured it had.
Brenda frowned. She leaned in towards him, speaking in a hush. "Sam it's just legal verbage. I'm not going to hash out every failing in our marriage for you if you don't already know." Then the rest seemed to burst from her before she could stop it. "You know if you'd been around a little more often maybe you'd have seen 'us' falling apart before it happened. If you're confused now," her last words were a biting whisper. "-it's not-my-fault."
He stared at her incredulously.
"If I'd been around more? Bren, I HAD to be away! Ya practically ENCOURAGED me to take every job that came up, said it'd be good, that I'd get promotion, more money an' all that.."
He fingered the edge of the paper anxiously.
"Was I really that bad that it came to this? Why couldn't ya have told me 'bout the fact ya didn't want me to be away? Don't y'all see why I'm so confused, Brenda?"
His latte sat and got colder as he stared imploringly at her, willing her to say words he understood. "Was I mean to ya? Cruel? Did I do somethin' that made ya think I was a bad man? I never had eyes for noone else, still don't."
Brenda closed her eyes, and lifted her hands as if to push him away, but it was just a gesture. "You did enough. Okay?" Her eyes were blazing as she opened them again. "You did enough."
"You can't play ignoramus to your half of this Sam." Her words became more bitter, more hurt filled as she spoke. "I refuse to believe this is all in my head. You hurt me, Sam, you hurt me too dammit." She pointed at her heart, the anger that had replaced hurt burning on her eyes. "It's too late now. You weren't willing to make our dreams come true then, it's too late to do it now."
She looked out the window, her jaw tensing. He knew if they weren't in public a lot more would come, sharper things, things that made less sense but cut a lot deeper.
"I..." He couldn't look at her, didn't want her to see the tears in his eyes. "I always wanted to make all ya dreams come true, Brenda, really I did. That's why I worked so hard. To get the money we needed to have that nice apartment, the car ya wanted..."
He stared down at the table.
"It's 'cos of what I am, right?" He'd been honest with Brenda right from the start about his mutantcy, but it had never been a problem, or so he had figured. "Ya hate me for what I am. It's fine, I understand that. Back home in Kentucky, the whole damn town hated me." He sighed.
Sam traced a pattern on the table with one finger. "I woulda done anythin' ya asked," he said, quietly. "Ya had only to ask. I'm real sorry, Brenda. I'd do anythin' to make it right, honest I would."
"Oh for Christ's sake Sam it has nothing to do with you being-" she paused, her eyes darting to the rest of the cafe around them. "-you being a mutant." Though she said that, it was true her parents, her family, and the society club in Atlanta weren't really that keen on having a mutant in their midst. Brenda had loved him anyway. Had being the important part.
"I did ask, Sam." She spat at him. "I -did-. You act like I asked you to build me a castle in the sky with a pile of feathers and your bare hands. You know, a lot of guys would have married me back home, but I chose you." Without a doubt, there was regret in her voice. "I wasted my time with you, you stole years from my life. You're a miner, Sam. I'm Jack Shepard's granddaughter, Sam, do you think I belong married to a coal miner?? You never wanted to be anything better than that. And to top it off, what little you did bring home was split between us and your mother! As if it's my fault she couldn't close her legs long enough to get her own job. As if she doesn't have your stepdaddy to take care of all of you!" Brenda huffed.
"That's why I'm taking it all back Sammy," She said his name derisively. "The house, the car, the investment accounts, all of it." Her tone was final, and she took a drink of water as if to do so was somehow shoving something else in his face.
"My Momma," he said, his voice low and shaking, "is a fine woman - an' I'll thank ya to watch ya mouth when ya talk about her. An' I ain't disputin' that ya may as well take back the apartment an' the money, I don't give a damn 'bout any of that. I love ya, Brenda! Don't that count for nothin'? An' if ya knew that I weren't ever gonna amount to nothin' more than a coal miner..." He put the same venomous emphasis on the words that she had done, "then why d'y'all marry me at all?"
He was barely keeping it together now, seeing himself as she was painting him: a thoughtless prick of a man who didn't devote enough time and effort to a marriage he had sincerely believed was made in heaven.
"Don't ya care none for me any more?" he said, quietly. "Is it all since we had that talk 'bout me wantin' us to start a family an' y'all not wantin' to? 'Cos if that's what was the final push, Bren, I take it back. Honest I do. I love ya!"
He looked up at her and his eyes were bright with tears. "But ya ain't gonna come back to me, I see that. Are ya gonna leave me anythin'? Any money to start afresh?" He didn't tell her that he'd been signed off work with stress and depression. She'd already have known due to the decrease in the income to the bank account.
It wasn't like Brenda to crack- she could play fire and venom with anyone for days on end, and tended to go chilly and distant rather than break down. So when tears filled her eyes, Sam should have known something was wrong.
"Starting a family?" her voice shivered, choked with tears. "Well it's a little late for that now, ain't it Sam?" She stood up, grabbing her purse.
"So much for this. Next time you want to talk, you call my lawyer." She turned stiffly around and rushed out the door, tears spilling down her face.
It didn't take Sam long to pay and hurry out after her. He wasn't going to let it end like this, it wasn't in his nature to let a woman he had caused to cry rush away from him like that. He caught her trying to hail a cab and caught her arm.
"Brenda," he said, his voice gentle and soft. "I'm so sorry, honey. I didn't mean for us to part like this. Please, let's at least try to be civil with one another. Please. After this, I swear to God I ain't ever gonna trouble ya again."
"Sam it's just not going to work out," she said tearfully, pulling her arm away from his grip and wiping her eyes. "I'm not coming back. I don't want to hate each other. Alright? I don't."
She looked up and down the street, trying to stop tears, but not able to. "If you can't deal with the future, Sam... then we can't talk. We both have to think about what we're doing from here out. Not dwell on what happened. Okay? I can't do it. I just can't."
"Don't cry, honey," he said, and he sounded anguished. "Ah, please don't cry. Here." He fumbled in the pockets of his trousers and found a clean handkerchief which he gave her. "I figured it ain't gonna work out. Ya made that abundantly clear. All I'm askin' is for a chance for us to at least separate like decent people."
He sighed.
"An' if ya walk away from me now, with tears all over the place - an' ya mascara runnin' everywhere, I ain't exactly gonna have given that impression, am I?"
He tried a tentative smile.
"That's all I want, Bren. I ain't expectin' no more.
"That's not the way you make it sound," she said, wiping carefully under her eyes. The cab drove away. "Like you want to convince me back."
After a moment to gather herself, she spoke more softly. "Sam we never worked out as it was. I think if you think about it, you'll see that's the truth. We're not a good match. Never were."
Hiccuping a little, she swallowed hard, and calmed herself. "I'm sorry, Sam." It sounded a little defensive, as if Brenda was getting back to her old self as quickly as she could. "I am."
"Y'all are right," he said, a little sadly. "I'm a big hulkin' idiot an' ya always have an answer for everythin'. I got all the brawn whilst ya got all the brains. An' the beauty." He smiled at her again. "Guess I always DID wonder what ya stayed with me for anyway. But I need to hear from ya, Brenda, just for my OWN peace of mind."
He led her away slightly from the road edge so that they were more or less lost in the crowd.
"I ain't a bad man, am I? Ya know that if I did hurt ya, I never did it 'cos I was tryin' to cause ya pain?"
Brenda crossed her arms over herself. She shooked her head a little tightly. "I don't know Sam. I know you didn't want to hurt me. Didn't make it better when you did."
"Sam, I..." she sighed and looked around them again. "There's things we have to talk about. But you can't do this." Brenda shook her head. "I don't want to do this."
He studied her face carefully, then nodded. "OK," he said, simply. "I ain't gonna push. Y'all call me when ya ready to talk."
Smiling carefully at her, he took a step back. "I ain't goin' nowhere. I'm up in Westchester for now. Ya got my number."
Brenda nodded, meeting his eyes only briefly.
"Take care of yourself, Sam." There was a tone of bitterness in her voice, but it was obvious she was doing her best to be sincere.
Moments later, another cab had shown up. She looked at him again for only a moment, then opened the door, and got in. The cab drove away, disappearing behind a dozen other cars.
